The Dragons of Ice and Snow (24 page)

Simon sat back, folded his
arms and examined his memory.

The dragon had flown
overhead very quickly. He and the two guardsmen had hidden and waited
a moment. There had been no sound of flapping wings and no
reappearance of the beast and then they'd been distracted when
Liliana showed up and that, oddly enough, was that.

He
stroked his chin, a little befuddled. Something was niggling at the
back of his mind.

There
had been no sound of flapping wings. He met Kronk's gaze blankly.
There had been no sound.

He
sat up so quickly that Ana yelped and pulled back in surprise.

“
There
was no sound of the dragon flying away!” he said loudly.

Kronk
was nodding in satisfaction and Simon caught his eye.

“
You
knew, didn't you?”

The
little guy shrugged.

“
I
guessed, master,” he said.

“
What
are you two talking about, sir wizard?” Ana sounded baffled.

“
Yes,
what exactly
are
you talking about?” Aeris asked in confusion.

“
Oh
come on, you two. Okay, Ana, you get a pass. I doubt that you've had
much experience with dragons.”

Simon
was forced to smile at the air elemental's look of irritation.

“
But
Aeris, you've been exposed to dragons more than once. Think about
them. When a dragon is flying over your head, even if they are very
high up, their wings sound like sails flapping in a high wind. That
sound is unmistakable.”

“
Okay,
that's true. But so what? What is your point?”

The
wizard glanced at Kronk.

“
The
dragon landed,” the little guy said simply.

Ana and Aeris both gaped
at him.

“
But...but, if
that's the case...”

“
If that's the
case,” Simon said darkly, “why didn't it attack? What was
it doing there? And what happened to it?”

Simon was sitting at the
top of his front steps a few days later, flipping a small rock from
one hand to the other and watching the afternoon clouds race across
the sky. His thoughts were aimless and he was simply letting his mind
drift from memory to memory.

A small sound from below
him made him look down.

Ana was standing there,
looking at him quizzically. She nodded at the smooth stone in his
hand.

“
Is that an
important object, sir wizard?” she asked.

With a smile, Simon handed
her the oval piece of rock and she turned it over in her hands
curiously.

“
There is a rune of
some sort written on it,” she said with mild interest. She
weighed it in her palm. The stone covered her entire hand.

“
Is it meaningful to
you?” she asked as she gave it back to him.

“
In a way. A couple
of years ago, I traveled back to my home town. Ottawa is a ruin now,
razed by the primal black dragon and its minions.”

“
The dragon you
destroyed?”

He shrugged.

“
Aquamastis and I
destroyed it, actually. Anyway, while I was there, I was confronted
by a group of Changlings.”

“
Like you?”

“
Not really, no.”

Simon looked down at the
stone and ran his fingers over it gently.

“
These Changlings
were originally children. It seems that those humans who were very
young when they Changed were mutated more deeply and, I don't know,
more grotesquely than those of us who were adults when it happened.”

Ana sat down and drew her
knees up to her chin. Her watery outline flowed and shivered like
jelly and Simon again found himself fascinated by the sight.

“
Grotesque? In what
way?” she asked.

“
It's hard to say.
Before my world went all to hell and technology failed, there were
reports in the mass media about children who were Changing. It
happened months before I began my own Change. Maybe their young
bodies were more easily mutated by the magic. But the reports said
that many of them became monstrous. Their fingers and toes would fuse
together, or their skin became bark-like, or scaled or...whatever.
Many lost the ability to speak, or began speaking in unknown tongues.
The reports went on and on.”

“
And you met some of
these young ones on your journey?”

“
Yes.”

He held up the stone.

“
One of them, Sarah,
gave me this. She used it to speak to me, sent me a warning when I
was being stalked by what later turned out to be a lich.”

“
A lich?” Ana
exclaimed, her eyes wide. “But they are incredibly dangerous!”

“
Yeah, no kidding. I
didn't know that then. That's a story for another time though.”

He went back to turning
the stone over and over in his fingers.

“
So what brought
this young person to mind today, sir wizard?”

“
I'm not sure. My
instincts as a magic-user are weird. Things occur to me now that
would never have entered my mind back when I was a mundane human.”

“
Such as?”

An errant breeze blew
Simon's hair across his face and he lowered his head and then flung
it back, feeling his hair cascade over his shoulders.

“
Such as the fact
that I never saw Sarah's true form. She and the other Changlings were
covered from head to toe with thick rags and pieces of clothing. I
only saw her hand when she gave me this stone. An elf named Ethmira
told me that what I thought I saw was not what was really there.”

Ana focused more intently
on Simon at the mention of the elf, but she remained silent.

He felt a little
embarrassed.

“
I think I scoffed a
bit at the time, so sure that I couldn't be tricked like that. But
back then I was a lot less experienced with magic than I am now.
Thinking about it at this moment, I'm sure that she was right.”

“
I am impressed that
the elves contacted you, sir wizard,” Ana said, still watching
him closely. “But what does any of this have to do with your
journey to aid the paladin?”

“
I think...”
Simon said, feeling his way through his words, “I think that my
subconscious is prodding me, telling me not to take anything at face
value.”

He flipped the stone in
the air like he would flip a coin and it landed on his palm,
rune-side up.

“
I think that I've
been deceived, Ana. Something happened in Moscow; something that I
missed. It has to do with that dragon and, I'm afraid, with Liliana.”

He clenched his hand
around the stone and tapped the side of his head with his fist.

“
But I don't know
what! It's bouncing around in my head like a rubber ball, but I can't
see the answer.”

He smiled weakly at her.

“
It's a bit
frustrating.”

The water elemental stared
across the front yard to the protective wall. One of Kronk's earth
elemental friends was walking slowly along the top, on constant
patrol. She watched it thoughtfully.

“
So you believe that
this paladin deceived you? Why? Do you think that she had something
to do with her peoples' deaths?”

“
What? No!”
Simon said quickly. “No, I don't think that. Her grief and rage
were too real. But yes, I do think that she is hiding something.
Something to do with that dragon we saw. But again, I don't know what
it could be.”

“
Have you considered
just asking her?”

The wizard barked a laugh.

“
Sure, I could see
that now. 'Hey Liliana, are you lying to me about what happened to
your people?' I think I'd be spitting out teeth about two seconds
after I asked
that
question.”

“
Hmm.”

Ana
continued to stare at the wall, her face screwed up in concentration.

“
I
must admit, I have not had a lot of contact with humans, except as a
servant. Socially, they are a mystery to me. So, you cannot simply
ask her. There is also an alternate way to gather intelligence.”

Simon
silently raised an eyebrow and Ana looked up at him.

“
Spy
on her.”

Simon
stood up with a sigh, brushed off the back of his robe and sat down
again. He reminded himself to sweep the steps later.

“
I'd
actually thought of that, as distasteful as it is to me. But Liliana
told me that she sensed me when I tried to contact her with my Magic
Mirror spell. She said that she was on patrol and blocked the
attempt.”

“
Did
she? Interesting.”

“
I
suppose so. She also said that Clara, my friend the cleric that lives
to the south of us, could do that same thing.”

“
I
see.”

Ana
shook her head in seeming wonder.

“
What
is it?” Simon asked her.

“
Nothing,
I suppose. I just did not realize that a paladin could lie. I didn't
think that it was in their nature.”

“
You
think Liliana lied to me?”

“
I
know she did,” she said with quiet assurance. “I know
what the powers of clerics are, whether they be warriors or healers.
They do not cast spells nor can they block them. Their power relies
strictly on the will of the gods. It is not possible that this
paladin blocked your spell.”

She
shook her head firmly.

“
Not
possible,” she repeated.

The wizard looked at her
in total confusion.

“
I don't understand.
She
did
block me. When I called her, I couldn't reach her. I'm sorry, Ana,
but you must be mistaken.”

As
he spoke, Simon realized that he might have offended the water
elemental. Instead, she simply smiled gently.

“
I
am not mistaken, sir wizard. I do not doubt that she blocked your
attempt to reach her. I am simply saying that she did not do so using
her holy powers.”

She
frowned as she stared down at the steps.

“
She
must have used other means,” Ana said slowly, obviously
thinking it through. “But what powers could she have beyond
those bestowed by the gods?”

She
glanced up at Simon and the two of them exchanged a long, confused
look.

The
wizard stood up abruptly and walked back into the tower, the water
elemental following behind him.

He
sat down at the kitchen table and picked up his hand mirror.

Ana
flowed up to the tabletop and watched him.

“
You
are going to try to contact the paladin?” she asked.

“
No,
I'm not. Something's not right here. I'm going to call Clara. Let's
see if Liliana was actually telling the truth.”

The
water elemental frowned a bit.

“
Not
that I'm doubting you,” Simon hastened to add. “But I'd
like to hear it directly from a cleric.”

“
Of
course, sir wizard. No offense taken.”

Simon
began to cast the Magic Mirror spell. While he was chanting, Aeris
floated in from outside and joined Ana on the table.

He
nodded at the wizard.

“
What's
going on?” he asked her.

“
Simon
is calling his cleric friend,” she told him. “I believe
we caught that paladin, Liliana, in a falsehood. He wants to confirm
it.”

“
Really?
But a paladin can't lie.”

“
So
I thought, but it seems she did, so...”

“
Um,
guys?”

“
Yes?”
Aeris and Ana answered in unison.

The
wizard looked at them in exasperation.

“
I'm
trying to cast here, okay?”

“
Well,
go ahead,” Aeris told him.

“
Yes
please. Don't let us stop you,” Ana added brightly.

Simon
suppressed a sigh and finished his Magic Mirror spell.

The
mirror fogged up and then cleared almost at once.

Clara
was standing at the edge of a field, chatting with several townsfolk.
Beyond her, Simon could see people walking along furrowed ground,
carefully planting seeds.

He
watched her for a few minutes until the cleric smiled and walked away
from the group.